Honey looked at him searchingly. “You must be stranger to these parts,” she said disbelievingly. “Do you think you can make me swallow that?”
Bud looked at her inquiringly, which forced her to go on.
“You must know about Catrock Canyon, Bud Birnie. Don't try to make me believe you don't.”
“I don't. I never heard of it before that I remember. What is it makes you want to explore it?”
Honey studied him. “You're the queerest specimen I ever did see,” she exclaimed pettishly. “Why, it's not going to hurt you to admit you know Catrock Canyon is—unexplorable.”
“Oh. So you want to explore it because it's unexplorable. Well, why is it unexplorable?”
Honey looked around her at the dry sageland they were crossing. “Oh, you make me TIRED!” she said bluntly, with something of the range roughness in her voice. “Because it is, that's all.”
“Then I'd like to explore it myself,” Bud declared.
“For one thing,” Honey dilated, “there's no way to get in there. Up on the ridge this side, where the rock is that throws a shadow like a cat's head on the opposite wall, you can look down a ways. But the two sides come so close together at the top that you can't see the bottom of the canyon at all. I've been on the ridge where I could see the cat's head.”
Bud glanced speculatively up at the sun, and Honey, catching his meaning, shook her head and smiled.